Review

Review Date: 8-June-08
Spoiler Rating: Medium
Juju Judgment: Juicy

Kung Fu Panda (2008)

Kung Fu Panda tells a rice-paper-thin story about the power of believing in oneself. The hero is a giant panda named Po (voiced by Jack Black) whose father wants him to be a noodle-seller but who is chosen through fate or chance to defend his village from a snow leopard (Ian McShane) seeking revenge against the resident kung fu master (Dustin Hoffman). Po is fat and silly and unexceptional yet he hangs in there to avoid letting himself or others down. That I am too jaded to experience major excitement over this moral is no reason to knock it. If I knew any children I would probably be thankful that such movies are available to them … as long as they could avoid the mass-market tie-ins.

What I enjoyed about Kung Fu Panda is more visual and comedic than thematic. Animation technology has reached the point where it is almost as gratifying to look at fanciful animals as it is to look at real ones. A talking panda with patched boxer shorts and a nice-guy demeanor rivals the cuteness of an actual panda, and don't even get me started on the kung fu master's fuzzy little ears and tail. (He looks like a russet-and-white fox, yet talk on the Internet pegs him as a kind of panda as well.) The freedom to capitalize on any critter's inherent nature enhances all aspects of the picture. On the dramatic side, there is real power in the image of a snarling cat frustrated by ambition (especially one bulked up like a wrestler); on the comic side, there is much whimsy in the sight of Po's colleagues, a crane, a monkey, a praying mantis, a snake, and a tigress, bonding as comrades through martial arts. (To emphasize their position as protectors, the everyday townsfolk are pigs, bunnies, or geese.)

Most of the movie's laughs fall into the whimsical category, with Black's exuberance sensibly toned down. (Must be the white in Po's fur and a tempering yin-yang dynamic.) You laugh with the striving panda instead of at him, and that feels better. The best scene combines both humor and artistic bravado, along with dazzling action, a critical turning point, and a plate of yummy dumplings. These things make the self-help message fun, so while Kung Fu Panda won't win any awards for complexity, it is thoroughly, basically sweet.

Copyright © 2008 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.